Scattered storms, like ideas, are heavier in some places than others

by maddrunkgenius

A bigot / misogynist who mistreats robot / AI. He renames his Siri-equivalent a slur, pretends at living in the antebellum South. The voice isnt recorded by anyone but automatically generated. The fellow is a miserable person, the sort who’d kick a dog if he had a bad day & people still owned dogs. But he doesnt. He doesnt own anything, even the AI. He pays a subscription for it. How you feel about the story depends on what sort of jobs he has. Maybe that’s the end of it: he leaves for work, and it isnt specified what the occupation is.

An alien species without malice. Hermit crabs who find a species capable of sentience in order to grow them, make them capable of progressing technologically enough to get off the planet & onto others. No, that sounds too much like Prometheus. But I cant imagine why space-farers would choose to inhabit the ruins of other civilizations, as was the original idea.

Humanity starts using viruses to re-write DNA and fix problems, like eyesight, congenital defects, etc. But it mutates & changes scent. People start to identify others by smell, physical reaction to those who don’t smell ‘right’. Society re-structured around pheromones, exile akin to death. But people can still communicate as long as it’s not in person, or they’re wearing containment suits. Protagonist has to be someone who lacks an identity.

It’s the future, and there’s little meat left except what’s in carapace. There is beef & chicken, but allocations of only 1kg of beef per year & 1kg of chicken per month, per adult person. Tastes terrible, only comes from animals that have died of age or disease. The poor can auction off meat ration to wealthier people, but also have first rights to their own family’s flesh.

Corpse meat can also be sold to Eaters of the Dead cults, or sold or rented to ravishers, who generally pay the most & buy bodies whole.

Church of Eternal & Righteous Love targets drug rehab centers to convert young to religion in hopes they’ll sign over their bodies before a fatal relapse.

Church of the Final Revelation started the trend off.

Story is of a family eating last meal with terminally ill mother, her tasting meat for the last time, and discussing what to do with her body. Treatment exists but too expensive; discussion of cost includes possibility that illness runs in family & money from selling body could provide for testing/treatment of children.

‘They were right about everything. It just had nothing to do with their daughter.’

Title is In Remembrance Of

The easiest way to add to life is stop sleeping

Pill lets you sleep for 2 hours, give or take, while remaining fully conscious and hallucinating.

Need prescription based on argument of utility. Need to have a useful job, be a ‘producer’ rather than a consumer, so only the wealthy can qualify.

‘There was a girl missing. Like all missing girls anyone cares to find out what happened to, this one was pretty. She also played saxophone more than decently and wore a short skirt and tall heels[?]. Her family thought that she’d been kidnapped or murdered. They wanted me to find out how and why. They could pay a month’s worth of No Doze, a quarter now to make sure I could stay hot on the trail, but three quarters when I’d done my job. But I’m an android. I have no lust for sleep or dreams. ~This has to be two ideas, not one.